Keeping It Together
by CreatorsOfWorlds
Summary: All they really have is each other. Organization Thirteen, and the ties that sometimes bind, sometimes choke, and ultimately keep them sane.


_A/N - Busy re-uploading Kingdom Hearts fics...  
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_Disclaimer__ - Do you have any idea how much it wrenches at my heart to say that I don't own them? Heartless copyrights…_

… _I just realized what I said. _

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_**Keeping It Together**_

_**o**_

_"Damaged people are dangerous. They know they can survive."_

_- Josephine Hart_

**_o_**

Those without hearts tended to operate on the same principles that those in extremely low temperatures did: huddle together. It conserved warmth, memories, and what dubious sanity remained to them, and though the selection of who to cultivate a certain closeness to was limited (the idea of attempting to 'make friends' with anyone outside the Organization, a notion which Roxas had timidly put forward at the dinner table one night soon after joining, was enough to send half the table into fits of laughter), in the end everyone managed to fit themselves awkwardly together, even if there were the occasional jibes, squirms, meltdowns, and assassination attempts (the latter mostly from Marluxia, who was also the one best able to keep up a perfectly saintly expression of innocence and righteous indignation while Xemnas questioned them all).

Saix kept his gaze on Xemnas, figuratively and literally, no matter what was going on, and seemed content with however much or little attention came his way from their dark-skinned leader. The others would often glimpse them deep in conversation, Saix usually confining himself to a few words and letting Xemnas' impassioned rhetoric carry the discussion along; and the sight of the blue-haired man waiting quietly in the shadows while Xemnas drank in the sight of Kingdom Hearts was a common one. Xigbar claimed to know for a fact that the berserker spent certain evenings in Xemnas' private chambers, though when Roxas asked him what that meant he'd only looked at him, sighed, patted him on the shoulder with the air of one making the best of a bad job, and told him 'You'll understand someday, kiddo."

Zexion and Lexaeus were almost never seen out of each other's company, and it was the common guess of the lower ranked that this was because of the scattered memories they must possess as members of the first five to form around Xemnas. Several pairs of envious eyes were turned their way on this account, though the pair coolly ignored them. Lexaeus would often carry him on his shoulder, the boy carrying on with reading whatever book he was currently buried in as if there was no difference between Lexaeus' shoulder and his favorite armchair. Due partly to that, no doubt, Lexaeus had become an excellent multi-tasker; keeping his hands occupied with the little metal puzzles he was so fond of during discussions and sometimes even meetings (all of Saix's glares and Vexen's pointed looks hadn't been able to break him of the habit, and none of the others complained much about the clinking because often when Xemnas embarked on one of his speeches you'd be glad enough, by the next hour, to have something, _anything _else to listen to), or issuing orders to Warrior Dusks while mopping the kitchen floor in the Castle That Never Was.

Demyx tried to be _everybody's _friend, though the one most able and willing to tolerate his bubbly companionship and childish conversation had been Axel, at least until Roxas and Xion arrived. After the fiery VIII began more obviously snubbing him in favor of his new friends, the now droopy and disconsolate IX began making the rounds of the other members, moaning and sobbing about how the newcomers had stolen his best friend and he'd never, _ever _get over it until Marluxia threatened to feed him to his plants, Xaldin threw a couple of lances at him, and Saix dangled him out of a tenth story window. Within a week Demyx had forgotten his recent heartbreak and was hanging around Roxas and Xion like an overgrown, friendly puppy, enchanted to have a new audience for his music.

Vexen was almost the opposite of Demyx; more often than not keeping himself locked up in his laboratory except when he was needed for something. His acidic remarks on how it was impossible to get any respect from your inferiors these days, as well as his real fascination with his work, might explain part of the reason, but even Vexen had to emerge every once in a while to coolly mingle with the others 'like coming up for air when you've been underwater', as Axel observed once, and a common sport among the Organization was betting on which days would see Vexen tearing himself away from his work to actually come sit at the dinner table with the rest of them like a 'normal nonexistent being', the last being another Axelism. Xion, when she was created, was the only one to actually seek his company out, apart from Xemnas on occasion, and the rest of Organization watched her frequent disappearances into Vexen's laboratory - and her even more astonishing reappearances - with open mouths.

Marluxia and Larxene, who had arrived close together at the end of the few weeks which had marked the first scrambled beginnings of Org. XIII, stuck more or less together from the beginning, although for the first while the rest of the members were uncertain as to whether it was more likely that they would kill each other, themselves, or all the rest of the Organization. If it wasn't Marluxia stalking gracefully around Larxene and eyeing her like a ladybug confronted with a particularly delicious aphid, it was Larxene draping herself around his neck and whispering things in a sugary tone which made Demyx, who was the only one close enough to hear, turn pale and distinctly say to his sitar, "I didn't even _know _most of those words!" Then one day, seamless in transition from the 'open warfare' period, they were inseparable, and Larxene spent most of her time off duty sunning herself in Marluxia's garden, and Marluxia was actually seen to offer her a few of his precious flowers. The rest of the Organization heaved a sigh of relief, and then promptly became strung up again over the new question of exactly how many horrible and potentially Organization-destroying things they could now be discussing together.

From the first few days that Roxas arrived and Axel was assigned the main task of keeping an eye on him, the two became, as Luxord observed in a sepulchral voice 'one creature with two heads'. The fact that the former pirate was decked the next moment by a severely irritated Axel did nothing to lessen the teasing from the rest of the group, which only intensified when VIII returned from Castle Oblivion to find Xion occupying his place. Everyone else was made aware of the fact that this was exactly how Axel felt about the matter during the ten-minute shouting match between he and Roxas at the dinner table before VIII and XIII stormed off in opposite directions, leaving Xion to shrink into herself in her seat and take the brunt of the comments from the rest of the dinner table. Then, with something of the eerie swiftness and silence that the Marluxia/Larxene pact had been accomplished - the resemblance was close enough and Castle Oblivion near enough in the past, that Saix took to having a few Berserkers follow the three around for some time - the three had all made friends together, and settled down into a contented jumble of pushing, joking, and sea-salt ice cream. 'One creature with three heads,' Luxord observed calmly, and had to duck a couple of keyblades and flaming chakrams.

Xigbar and Xaldin were most often seen together - the lower rankings suspected for the same reason that Zexion and Lexaeus were - swapping stories about how many Heartless they'd killed recently, and absent-mindedly throwing lances, shooting bullets, and tossing knives at each other. Even though Xigbar complained and shirked and ducked most of the work he should have been completing as technical second-in-command, allowing it to fall on Saix's shoulders, and Xaldin was one of the most uptight with the neophytes on the subject of laziness, they still managed to hold a deep and enduring respect for each other, which baffled most of those who watched them. Boots cocked up on a table and his hands behind his head, Xigbar would invent or relate any number of outrageously romantic stories and the kind of fairy tale which Axel referred to in disgust as 'lovey-dovey', and as fast as he did Xaldin would cap them off with tragicomic endings where the hero tripped and fell onto his sword, the maiden discovered that she would rather start her own business than marry a prince, and the happily-ever-after of the lovers was spoiled by the entire family of their in-laws coming to stay with them permanently.

Luxord was a restless drifter, moving from one group to another, putting into port, so to speak, and filling their days with tea that tasted of rum and smoke and the faint, salt scent of seawater before hauling up his anchor and moving on, usually with his own pockets much heavier than they had been before, and those of the landlubbers much lighter. It all came, as Demyx remarked mournfully as he watched Luxord sailing off into the distance (he still walked with something of a roll) with most of Demyx's pay for that month, of being altogether too good at what you did. Luxord was the perfect gentleman, fascinating, polite and colorful, and at first you welcomed his company eagerly. It was only several days later, when he bade you a courteous farewell and went on to the next clique of members, that you remembered that he was also a pirate, and that perhaps if you had been wise you would not have said quite so much when you were intoxicated, or played quite so many of the kind of game where you stayed up all night and couldn't remember your wins or losses in the morning. Then, after a few weeks when you'd forgotten your vows of vengeance, and your pockets were full again, back he'd come, and the whole thing would start over again.

About the only time the entire Organization ended up in the same place together, apart from the council chamber, was at the dinner table. And that, as Axel said (they all found themselves quoting Axel far more often than they liked to think about it), was probably what made the dinner table so interesting. But still -

"Keep close," Xemnas had commanded in their first broken, bewildered days of pulling themselves together and trying to discover what they were. "Stay together. Trust nobody but each other. Since we are - what we are, anyone else would try to destroy us. We must learn to be sufficient unto ourselves."

Leader-sama might be a tad long-winded at times - when he really started holding forth on one of his favorite topics, half the Organization was mentally playing Hangman by the time he finished; the other half was just hiding the paper and pencils - but when he spoke in that certain voice, they all listened.

Not all of them might have been able to trust each other. There might have been fights, sometimes cruel words, and always the gnawing sense of doubt as to what any of them even were.

But they were all they had. And even though it was never enough - it was something. Something more than nothing.

They all remembered being nothing. It scared them. They didn't want to be that way ever again. So they stayed together, together with the numbers that ranked them and the names that defined them and the purpose which gave them a reason for being.

Organization Thirteen. That was them. Not enough.

But more than nothing.

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_ No, I don't really buy into the whole they were (or are, depending on what's going on in the storyline at this point) sociopaths. Messed up and amnesiac yes, but in my opinion the facts just don't fit the other idea - it always seems to be my fate to be lurking in the rearguard of whatever fandom I join, heroically waving my little pieces of fiction in the air and insisting that the canon is contradicting itself.  
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_Ah well. That's not really important at the moment. Reviews?_


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